As I already explained in the first Usability Terms article, consistency goes a long way in ensuring a pleasurable user experience in graphical user interfaces. While some user interfaces appear to be more graphically consistent than others, Windows has always appeared to be worse than most others - probably because it carries with it stuff that dates back to the 16bit era. IStartedSomething agrees with this, and started the Windows UI TaskForce.

//Therefore I believe proprietary software is bad for humankind in the long run. Which is why I promote Free Software (Linux/BSD/KDE/Gnome), Free Culture (Blender/Magnatune/Creative Commons) and Free Knowledge (Wikipedia & friends).//

OK ... so ... how does Microsoft's existence prevent you from doing/using any of that? I'm confused. I thought Linux/OSS was growing every year?